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Paul McCartney Turns 70: A Birthday Card To Macca

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On the occasion of Sir Paul McCartney’s 70th birthday today, June 18, 2012, we decided to write a little birthday note to the music icon.

Dear Sir Paul –

In 1967, when you were just a young man of 24, you dared to imagine what love would be like at 64, an age that probably seemed quite old at the time. On “When I’m 64,” you imagined a quiet life of cottage in the Isle of Wight, bouncing grandchildren on your knee and gardening, all with a bit less hair atop your head. Would you have ever expected that at 64 – nay, now 70 – you would still be traveling the world playing sold-out shows? And still with a full mop-top intact (unless you’ve been fooling us all with a top-notch toupee)!

Your on-stage stamina would be impressive at any age, but 70? A “active” day for most 70-year-olds is a jaunt around the neighborhood, not a three-hour concert under hot lights in which you hop from one instrument to another and still insist on wearing a suit. You’ve written hundreds, possibly thousands of songs in your lifetime, and you manage to recall the words to your dozens of hits throughout the show. Yet you’re certainly not just skating by on your catalog of hits. Fifty years in and you’re still writing and recording new music, as recently as your album, Kisses on the Bottom, back in February.

Like the romantic you come across as on “Maybe I’m Amazed,” you haven’t given up on love, marrying your third wife Nancy Shevell last year. It’s clear from the way that you live that your age is an afterthought, not an inhibitor and an indication of your mindset. Whatever you’re doing (yoga? that vegetarian diet that Linda was so fond of?), keep doing it. Amidst your peers, you are rock’n’roll’s fountain of youth – no easy feat given the antics of your 20s.

As you continue to age gracefully, we tip our hats to you and your many lives – a Beatle, a solo artist, a band leader, a husband, a father, a grandfather, and an all-around musical badass. We think you summed up most of what we want to say in a certain White Album song, which your fellow British rock star Paul Weller covered just for you today:

They say it’s your birthday
We’re gonna have a good time
I’m glad it’s your birthday
Happy birthday to you